I originally wanted a trestle bridge for a good-sized diorama I was building. However, after most of the work was done, I just wasn't happy with the diorama. I salvaged the trestle bridge for use in another, smaller diorama. This page documents how I built this bridge, and it will conclude with the new diorama (a display stand for a locomotive). Several years ago I attempted to build a trestle bridge, but abandoned it because I found it to be boring work.

The bridge is 150 scale feet long and 120 scale feet tall. The design follows the practices of the Pennsylvania Railroad (or at least that is what I was shooting for). The measurements and overall design came from diagrams found in the book "Trackside on the Pennsylvania, Volume 2" by Jeff Scherb, published by Highlands Station, Inc.

Before I decided to tackle my second attempt at a trestle bridge, I realized that I needed a way to make the individual bents quickly. This is where I lost my interest in my first attempt at making one of these bridges. The photo below shows a bent assembly jig I made based on the design I picked to follow. It was made from a sheet of Plastruct styrene, and individual thin strips of styrene that fit the scale wood I used.

Using the jig shown above, I built the various bents for the bridge. I didn't take any photos of the actual construction of these bents in the jig. The basic flow was to line up the vertical posts in the jig. I made small marks on the jig to indentify where the horizontal boards were to go. I glued them to the vertical posts using yellow carpenter's glue (a very thin amount applied with a toothpick). When those were dry, I apply cross braces on the one side. After those were dry, I trimmed the bent on the bottom, installed the bottom boards, and removed the bent from the jig. I flipped it over and installed the cross braces on the other side.



The next photo shows a close-up of one of the bents. I started applying nut-bolt-washer simulations by making a tiny dot with an ink pen. It worked well. However, I stopped doing it after a while, because I realized that most, if not all, aren't going to be visible when the whole bridge is finished.



The bents at the end of the bridge have planks glued to them. These are supposed to act like bridge abutments, holding back the dirt from the surrounding surface.



With the bents done, my next focus was on constructing the bridge platform. The platform had to be perfectly straight. Strip wood has a tendency to warp a little, so I made this temporary jig which would hold the long boards in the right location. I placed spacer strip wood pieces in between the two rails of boards I am gluing up here. Various weights, clamps, and metal bars were used to hold the whole thing together while the glue dried.



Next, I glued bridge ties to the boards. Special long ties were used for the area that will have the fire prevention water barrel.



Then two guard rails were installed. I also applied additional weathering under the area where the rails will sit.



After the platform was finished. I glued the bents to the bottom of the platform. After that I installed the cross braces on both sides to hold the bents apart at the right distance. The final result is shown below (the curving is due to the photography, not the bridge's construction).



I have constructed a stand for the trestle bridge from three pieces of Oak plywood. My plan is to add scenery inside this stand so that the bridge doesn't seem to be "floating".